Christer & Cat

I keep going back and forth on names- last couple days I’ve really liked Mason Range Edwards. Here’s the thing- Christer and I have always liked the name Jack (more than Jackson) and so I think we had decided even before we were having children that our boy would be named Jack. Mason is just an incredible name in my mind. Strong, good character, compassionate, etc. I really am getting kind of stuck on it. Christer likes Mason as a middle name. Range is my father’s middle name. I would go with Christer’s middle name but he won’t have that.

So those are the names we’ve been playing around with. Maybe I’ll have Christer put a poll on the site.

So I’m thinking the name Jack Mason Edwards will be the one- any comments?

I am 15 weeks and 2 days along today and went in for my check-up. My mom was able to come with me while Grandma Edwards played with the girls. I asked Dr. Farley if we could do a quick ultrasound. He of course humored my request but let me know that I am pretty early and I won’t be able to find out the gender of the baby unless it is in just the right position and even then- it would be pretty hard. Well he was wrong. The baby was in the perfect position and INSTANTLY both the doctor and I saw what we came to see- there was no doubt in either of our minds.

As the doctor put it, our little baby has a “ditsel.” (boy)

Tomorrow MAY be the day we find out what we are having! Christer is certain that we are having another girl- I’m thinking boy this time around. We’ve been tossing around name ideas and I’d like to see what you think-

#1 for a girl would be: Reese Anne (my suggestion)

#1 for a boy would be: Jackson Range (both came up with it- Range is my dad’s middle name)- We’d call him Jack.

What suggestions do you have? We don’t like “popular” names- but of course with both girls we ended up LOVING names that were climbing the charts that year! Just so you remember- if you want to compare sibling names- Addison Jane, Elizabeth Marie.

Last night our neighbors invited us and another family over for dinner. There were two 3 year old boys. Addison of course tried to play with them the most but “boys will be boys.” She kept up with them for the most part, but it was easy to tell that they didn’t want a girl to play with them. A couple hours into it I heard Addison crying and I looked over to find both boys next to her and one of them then said, “Take it from her!” All three of them were holding onto a car that Addison had been playing with. The boys obviously didn’t want it to play with- they just wanted to take it from her. Addison doesn’t cry easily so when I saw what was going on I realized they had been doing this for a while and Addison was still holding on to that car as hard as she could. I yelled something to the effect of “Boys! leave her alone!” Once Christer realized it was Addison crying he jumped up from the table and ran to her and actually YELLED- “HEY!” The boys were startled and let go and their parents disciplined them. Christer scooped Addison up in his arms and comforted her. Later on that night at home, we were talking about that incident  and Christer still got a little upset about it. He said that even though they were only 3 years old he want to smack them for making his little girl cry. He then said,” I don’t care who you are, if you look at my girls wrong, I’m going to take you out.” It was really cute to see the protective papa bear emerge.

Lizzie just adores her dad and is calling him “Da” now. This morning she was looking for him, walking around calling out, “Da, Da, Da?” It was pretty cute. When I told her that dad was already at work she stuck out her bottom lip and tried one more time, “Da?” I told her that he would be back soon and she was content with that answer.

I love my girls

So- we have A LOT to catch up on!

I am a working mom now at American Nutrition Inc. as a personnel assistant. It’s been… entertaining, stressful, and mostly makes me miss my kids. Christer is working at PartNet still and also teaching at the U of U. He loves that he’s “Faculty” at the university.

Addison is now 2 years old going on 7. She is extremely bright and loves to color, paint, ride her bike, run, “work” – which means she’s fixing something with the screw driver, cook, wash dishes, read, and try to take over her sister just to name a few. She’s carrying on full conversations telling about what she did, who she was with, etc. It’s really quiet entertaining having her in our family. She’s learning the “house rules” which are: 1. Listen/Do 2. Be Nice 3. Clean-up. She is a very fast learner and Christer and I are realizing that we’re going to need to start saving for her college fund asap! Christer is thinking MIT

Lizzie has such a spunky personality and can easily hold her own next to her sister. She started walking only a month ago be is so agile and has such awesome balance. She’s going to be our gymnast. We’re thinking the Olympics She loves to be outdoors and I think she’s going to love swimming this summer. Lizzie has the personality that is SUPER friendly, she gets along great with other adults and children alike. I was in the nursery at church for awhile and so Lizzie came with me and Addison- and she completely captured the room. The children loved playing with her and she loved pretending she was as big as they were.

Baby Edwards #3 is coming along great. Due date is Dec. 19th but both the doctor and I are planning on the baby coming early so we’ll see! I saw the doctor today and he did an ultrasound  (he loves doing them- I of course LOVE having them)! It was so amazing! With the girls I saw them move and they each have their own ultrasound story- so this is the story for baby #3 (I’m still giggling:) ). Dr. Farley started the ultrasound and I immediately could see the baby and could tell where everything was- he/she was curled up with it’s hand over it’s eyes/face. Then he/she stretched out and I could we had a prefect view- just looking at him/her with it’s belly up and then it started to kick it’s legs and wave it’s arms pretty intensely- even Dr. Farley was a little taken back by it.  So we just watched and laughed as it went on for maybe a minute. Then little baby put his/her hand back over it’s face and curled up like he/she was taking a nap. It was incredible!

So that’s that for now- got to get back to work!

Love you all!

Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve posted- It’s hard to find an hour to myself anymore. We have a lot of catching up to do! First let’s take care of Lizzie She is such an energetic, happy-go-lucky kind of baby! She has the personality that you just can’t get enough of. She is smiling constantly- talking… constantly- moving- more like turbo moving…constantly. She just turned 4 months last week and she is ready to get up and run around with Addison. She rolled over for the first time On October 12th and I haven’t seen her sit still since then. She’ll launch herself with her powerful legs off and into anything she’s around. Yesterday she scooted across an entire room only to find herself under the coffee table- she didn’t like that very much and start to try to get my attention to help her. I left her there but cheered her on and she continued scooting until she was next to the couch- which she then tried to squeeze under LOL! Also, Lizzie woke up yesterday after her nap with 2 red marks on her face- one across her forehead and one across her mouth- when I went to get out of her crib- mind you she wasn’t crying- it looked like she was trying to chew her way out! She is such an incredible joy to have in our family and always brightens my day.

Addison is such a big girl now! She LOVES to wash the dishes (or the frisbee if the sink is clean) and help me with whatever I’m doing in the kitchen. Her hair is long enough that I can put it into pig-tails which makes her look just adorable! I try to do it everyday but she’ll only let me a couple times a week. She’s still pretty shy around strangers- but has REALLY opened up to her grandparents and she loves talking to them and being cute enough that they’ll do almost anything for her Addison loves the outdoors and I’m really excited to see her reaction when we get some substantial snow fall. She’s getting a little nervous around bugs, but still loves to play in the dirt. She is a great big sister and gives Lizzie loves several times a day.

Halloween was a ton of fun this year since Addison could get into it. She was a “Pirate Princess” and Lizzie was a bunny. We went to 2 trunk-or-treats. One on Friday night at my ward and one on Saturday night at my sister’s ward.

Addison felt like she could make her own grilled cheese sandwich. She would bite a chunk off the cheese block and then flip the bread in the skillet (don’t worry the stove was not on) and then take some bread out- bite it and flip it again. Pretty funny

Here is Addison washing whatever she can find- including the frisbee I love those pig-tails!

Addison is enjoying the first snow of the season with Grandma.

Poor girl wore herself out jumping around

Under the coffee table!

My happy-go-lucky girl!

Addison is playing with the neighbor boy Franklin- they are just putting rocks up there and watching them fall out…

What will entertain them next?!

For those who want to know if Lizzie looks like Addi – you can compare their 2 month pictures- I’d love to hear what you think!

Elizabeth Marie is 2 months old!!! She is such a blessing to have in our family. When she was only a week old we took her to the zoo- she slept through most of it, but I’m sure she enjoyed it One night while Liz and I were still in the hospital, I laid her on a pillow and just talked to her. She suddenly went cross-eyed and I started laughing. Immediately following the look came a HUGE explosion in her diaper. It just made the look she gave even funnier. When we got home Addison was ready to have her mom back. It was nap time and diapers needed to be changed. Mom was going to change Lizzie’s diaper and Dad was going to change Addison’s diaper. BUT Addison had to “show” Lizzie how to get your diaper changed. Lizzie already has a special bond with her sister Addison.

About a month ago Mom and Dad were in bed and getting Lizzie ready for bed too.  Liz started “talking” to mom about how it went with dad while mom put Addison to bed. Dad smiled at us because my “yeah, oh- I’m sorry, uh-huh, yeah, okay I’ll tell him” along with her cooing sounded like a real conversation. So I turned to dad once Lizzie stopped and told him that Lizzie wants him to know that when she’s fussy like that it’s because she wants to cuddle on her tummy with him not her back. Dad acknowledged and I turned back to Liz to make sure I told him everything she wanted me to- she was satisfied and went on to tell me how hard it is being a baby sometimes

It was really fun. Addison LOVES kissing Liz and now she’ll even sit on the couch and pull a pillow over her lap and ask to hold Lizzie.

Lizzie is a big scooter already! Her legs are so strong that she can stand on her own almost since birth! She can’t balance of course but it’s amazing the strength she has already. I put her on the boppy the other day to get some tummy time and she kicked herself over it- so her head was on the other side on the floor- her arms were a little stuck so she couldn’t really do much from there, but I’ll tell ya- she’s going to be a strong girl.

Here is Lizzie on her one month birthday. She really likes being in the bean bag~

If you think she looks long- well you’re right. She’s in the 98% for her length and 75% for weight.

My big girl Addison is 18 months old TODAY! She has grown up so much just in the last couple months. Addison loves her little sister and will give kisses to her whenever possible. Today when we got home from the Hill Air Force Museum Liz was crying and Addison looked at her and pointed to me and said “Mom” as if she were telling Lizzy that mom is coming, it’s okay Addison has a new fascination for Elmo. We watch an episode of Sesame Street at least 600 times this past weekend! She loves to be with people, show her belly button, laugh, make cookies, help clean up, sing songs, dance, mimic animal sounds…. I can’t even list everything she’s into and learning! She knows a hand full of signs and is becoming a very polite girl by signing “please.” Her mind is a sponge and I am excited to see what we can fill it with- she catches onto things so quickly!

We went to the zoo a week after Elizabeth was born- Addison had a blast smiling and waving at the monkey’s.

We went outside one morning and got caught in the sprinklers- I was too late getting the camera but we had a blast

When Grandma Johnson came to visit the first time this month we went to the Treehouse museum and Addison showed her sponge mind Here she is in the school house- she really enjoyed this.

Like I said before Addison loves to make cookies. I’ll put the mixing bowl on the floor so that we can stir it together. Then she’ll eat the cookie dough.

She found a new peek-a-boo spot: the towel cabinet in the master bath – it’s funny to watch her climb in and then shut the door. Here she is hiding from the camera- I hope you see the smile in her eyes that she’s covering

Some friends came over the other night and she and Elise sat on the stairs and ate their popsicles.

Same night with the friends… Jackie and Addison would have their “pow-wows” and show their belly button and laugh and chase each other.

After a thunderstorm  Addison was quick to play in the water.

I love Addison so much and I’m glad she’s apart of our family. She is so inspirational and cheerful. She is such a good daughter and a great sister.